


Blood and Blooms

by LadyKeane



Category: Blackadder, Jeeves & Wooster, Jeeves - P. G. Wodehouse
Genre: Apollo and Hyacinth, Art, Blood and Noise and Endless Poetry!, Crossover, Diary/Journal, Drag, Epistolary, Established Relationship (Bertie/Jeeves), Fluff and Angst, M/M, Music Hall, POV First Person, World War I
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-03-05
Updated: 2017-03-05
Packaged: 2018-09-28 11:25:26
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 3
Words: 15,168
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10098353
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LadyKeane/pseuds/LadyKeane
Summary: Bertie is made to attend the funeral of one of Dahlia's old chums, a retired General by the name of Melchett. That night at Brinkley Court, the dearly departed's journal is discovered, and a curious Bertie settles in for some bed-time reading.





	1. Chapter 1

_'Edwardian-Georgian Gothic? Why, that's just not kosher!'_ '  
—Lady Florence Craye, in a moment of thorough revulsion  
  
BLOOD AND BLOOMS  
A Jeeves/Blackadder crossover   
  
PART I  
  
'Jeeves?'  
'Yes, Bertram, my radiant Hyacinth?'  
'Why d'you s'pose Aunt Dahlia is so keen to drag me down to old Worcestershire?'  
'Forgive me, sir, but I was under the impression that you enjoyed visiting your aunt.'  
'Yes, but for a _funeral_ , Jeeves? For some stern old army toff that I never even met? Seems a dashed ghastly business. Anyway, I thought she'd be worried that I'd make an ass of myself during the wake. End up offending the old bird's widow or knocking over the wreaths.'  
'I believe Mrs. Travers' familial affection for you allows her to overlook any prior indiscretions,sir. Furthermore, it is quite a significant occasion. The deceased was a decorated General who stood in high regard, not only in your aunt's circle, but within the ranks of the military as well.'  
'Big war hero, was he? I thought chaps like him all endeavoured to die on the battlefield, shielding puppies from Huns, or something like that.'   
One of Jeeves' eyebrows twitched. 'That is… quite a romanticised appraisal of military life, sir.'

I frowned, catching my manservant's sudden sober tone, which put one in mind of a clement, shimmering spring abruptly turning glacial. Flopping the old onion down on a pillow, I allowed myself to sink into a sulk. I hate funerals. Sometimes I've heard more well-meaning souls insist that they are celebrations of the dearly departed's life. If indeed they are, then the ecclesiastical among us have made a right bally mess of it. Black, stiff Sunday best, the dreary droning of _requiems_ and _eternems_ , as the d. d. is shut up in a box and heaved into a dank hole in the ground. I never liked the idea of that last element—such a frightful way for one to see out eternity. There's a C word, Jeeves would know it... creating? Cerrating? Anyway, the jist of the whole process is that aforementioned d. d. is set upon a funereal pyre, the body smouldering away like so much driftwood, thus letting the spirit free to make a break for the cerulean splendour of the celestial plane. So much more liberating than all this six-foot-under rot.  
The last, and only, funeral I had attended was that of my parents. Dreadful business, utterly dreadful. Suffice it to say, funerals in general did not recommend themselves to the Wooster sensibilities.

With his usual brand of slightly supernatural intuition, Jeeves must have picked up on this last unhappy thought, as I felt a set of wondrously strong arms snake about the midsection. The clement spring thawed out again, and the lovely large head that rested itself upon my shoulder pressed its lips to me.  
'Please do not distress yourself over the upcoming ceremony, Bertram. You will be surrounded by those who love you. I shall endeavour to never leave your side.'  
As I liquefied leisurely in his embrace, I silently hoped that Jeeves had commited to this last declaration not only for the length of the dreary proceedings, but for the rest of the whole mortal coil. Even the bits of it pertaining to Wickhams, Cheesewrights and emerald-green knickerbockers.   
  
Before I continue on, perhaps I should clarify some of the particulars of the above tableau. Most of the readers of the Wooster chronicles would have envisioned the previous conversation taking place in the lounge room of our little flat. The staging would probably follow like this: self plonked cosily on the chesterfield, favoured b. and s. on a tray at self's elbow, with self's valet standing stalwartly off to the side like the palacial (or glacial?...) guard of some old world Empress. Now, I'm not saying that many a jolly afternoon hasn't passed in such a manner. But, as it happens, this afternoon did not. Seeing as I have assurance that those perusing these lines do not regard the intimate relations of free consenting men a criminal offence, let alone a mental illness (By Jove, what would poor Doc Glossop make of it!), I am free to relate the actual state of affairs. Where self was _really_ cosily plonked was betwixt the mussed blankets of self's bed. To be precise, in the agreeably powerful-yet-tender clutches of self's valet. Upon the inauguration of our little union, Jeeves had impressed on me the importance of discretion. To those parts of England scanned by the public eye, we were still regarded as no more than gentleman and gentleman's personal gentleman. To the quieter, more intimate corners of the Empire, where the harsh discords of the lark give way to the nightingale's song (a certain corner of Berkeley Square, mostly), we had become as dippy for each other as any two yearning hearts could be.

Hard to imagine, what? A towering paragon such as Jeeves being sweetly, soppily in love with a dope like me? Truth be told, I'm still pinching myself. What's more, I've awakened a suprising penchant for pet names in him. None of that Bassett-esque 'schmoopy schnuggums' business, mind you— most of them reference sonnets and odes and such that I used to yawn over at Eton. Usually his endearments send me scurrying to the extensive library in his lair, eager to decipher their meaning.

That morning, the very moment I had replaced the receiever to the telephone and updated Jeeves on Aunt Dahlia's orders re: lugging my indolent hide to her place for the funeral, something of a sparkle had entered my man's dark eye. The next thing I knew I was being hauled, bridal style, in a bed-wards directon. Given the circs, valet-turned-paramour and I had deemed it best to spend the remaining hours before hie-ing hence to Brinkley Court indulging our passions to the fullest extent. Once we were under the same roof as others, all corporeal urges would have to subsist on Anatole's culinary ecstasies.   
Though _caille en sarcophage_ and _moules à la crème Normande_ might at least have been a decent consolatory prize, my mind was on neither as we whizzed along in the Aston Martin the next morning. Nor was it on the doubly delectable activities of yesterday. All I could ponder were the looming last rites of the sad old blighter who I would only know of as a cold corpse. It is not easy to cloud the Wooster brow with melancholy thoughts, but being made to confront the kicking of the bucket in such an up-front way makes all other ugliness pale in comparison. Were it not for the warmth of Jeeves' tweed-enrobed form squished up against me, my courage would have surely buckled, sending me speeding back to the metrop. with all the agitation of a hound-pursued fox.  
  
ooOOoo  
  
The greetings and salutations at Brinkley Court were somewhat tempered, in light of the sad occasion. Other guests were staying for the ceremony, mostly wizened old family friends, Aunt Dahlia's hunting chums, and dour military types who could give Aunt Agatha a run for her money in the devouring-of-innocent-fluffy-creatures department. One silver lining amongst the morass of leaden c.s was the appearance of Tuppy Glossop, one of my nearest and dearest, who had likewise been dragged along by my cousin Angela. He was far from pleased to be stuck with the mourners, and we latched onto each other to whinge mutually.  
'Bertie, do you realise that as we speak, the Drones are holding their annual wardrobe-raiding parties?' He lamented to me that evening in the garden room. 'The contestant who nicks the most ladies' undergarments gets their yearly bar tab paid for by the rest of the club!'  
I clicked my tongue, thinking of my long-suffering coz and being privately grateful that Tuppy was shielded from such a diversion. (My mind also roved to the well filled stock room of Eulalie Boutique, but only briefly.)

I did eventually manage to track down the beloved sister of my late father, and ask her as tactfully as possible why she had invited me to the funeral of a man who had lately been unknown to me.  
'Because, you blistering cold sore, not only was he one of the greatest Generals who has ever served Blighty, but his family and the Travers have been friends and neighbours for centuries. He introduced me to your Uncle Tom, taught me how to ride a horse, and he also looked after your second cousin George during the Great War.'  
'My second cousin George?' Did the sprawl of my extended family _never_ end?  
'Your Grandmama Wooster's kid brother's son. Lovely singing voice, could really swing a paintbrush around, but otherwise the greatest pea-brain I ever knew… well, until _you_ blessed this family.'  
'And is this George chap among the mourning party?'  
'That would be logistically difficult, seeing as he bought it from a round of machine-gun fire at Flanders.'  
This further reminder of mortality did nothing to bolster my s.

The morning of the big day came, and Ma Nature spared no cliché. The old girl opened with an overture of ethereal mist cloaking the countryside, lifting to a grey overcast sky and the silvery drizzle of Sping rain.  
We shuffled along into St. Sebastian's, the charming chocolate box of a stone chapel just on the outskirts of Market Snodsbury. Jeeves, Tuppy and I claimed a pew right in the back of the packed church, squashed in worse than a certain small, nutritious saltwater fish into its tin. It seemed like half of the British aristocracy had seen half of the British army hightailing it to the sombre shindig and thought it was a spiffing idea to gatecrash. Standing Room Only doesn't begin to describe the crush. I asked Jeeves why such a high-ranking official had deemed this small building the best venue for such a turnout, and my man informed me that the General had given very 'particular' (read: barmy) instructions before his passing.  
I tried not to look at the elaborate mahogany coffin that stood before the altar. Happily, there were a few gargantuan dress hats and a huge bouquet of delicate, star-like flowers sitting atop the horrific vessel, both of which helped in its concealment. I had never seen an actual dead body, but being in the same room as one was not something I wanted to make a habit of. I tried to focus on the monotone of the grey-haired parson, and made a game of staring alternately at my left and right shoes. All in all, it was not as grisly an experience as I had foreboded. Jeeves must have mistaken my bowed head for grief, for at one point, I felt the slightest movement of his hand over mine. Nobody in the elbow-to-nose crowd noticed or cared, and covertly, we interlaced fingers.

The procession and burial were given with full military honours. The booming salutes, sea of umbrellas, strident drumming and ashes-to-ashes-ing is something I'm sure you can infer.  
My first impulse was to get the deuce out of the eerie cemetery, back to Brinkley Court for the savoury repast of the wake. But Aunt Dahlia seemed determined to be the last mourner at the graveside. I had seen so little of my favourite aunt during the whole occasion, and it had not really occurred to me how sorely she might be missing the d. d. As the crowd thinned, I screwed my courage to the sticking place and remained by the good woman's side, trying not to think about what lay underneath the grass.  
Finally the graveside was divested of all but three. Jeeves held his generous sable umbrella over myself and my aunt. The latter tossed a bunch of pale, indigo-tinged flowers upon the fresh grave.  
'Poor Uncle Anthony. May he now find true peace, whatever plane of existence he's biffed off to,' she sighed.  
'Oho, so he is a member of our bloodline?' I asked.  
'No, you dolt, but we was as good as. Loved us too dearly, he did. He never married, you see, never had a family of his own.'  
'What's with the bluebells?' I asked her, indicating the little garland she had placed on the soil, probably sounding a bit too much like an annoyingly inquistive three-year-old.  
'I believe those are hyacinths, sir. Known formally as _Hyacinthus Orientalis,_ native to Asia Minor, they are classified in the family of Liliaceae. Being a cousin of _Lilium longiflorum_ , they are a most fitting funerary—'  
'Hyacinth? I say, Jeeves, wasn't that the name you called m—'  
'Yes, sir, Hyacinth was a divine hero of the Ancient Greeks, who had his own cult located in the Peloponnese. It is for him that the plant was named.'  
'Ah. I see. There you are then. Righto. Jolly good.'  
'He grew them after the war,' the aunt in our midst continued, valiantly trying to block out the Wooster white noise. 'They were his favourite flower. Look, there's even one engraved on the tombstone.'

I followed her pointing finger to the relief at the apex of the marble slab. Indeed, it was a geometrically pleasing festoonment of the pretty little blossoms, destined forever to bloom in their cold white form, unlike the asymmetrical organic matter that lay beneath. It took me quite by surprise. I had expected something a little more militaristic, like a regimental crest of two crossed dead Germans, emblazoned on a mound of dead Germans. But such was not to be.  
Beneath it read:

Here lies General Sir Anthony Cecil Hogmanay Melchett VC DSO KCB  
10th July 1869 – 29th March 1933  
Aged 63 years.

_"The damp stands on the long green grass_  
As thick as morning's tears,  
And dreamy scents of fragrance pass  
That breathe of other years."   
—Emily Brontë  
  
ooOOoo  
  
Jeeves sought to console me further by suggesting reading material. Since the liturgical whatsits about the holy K. of H. did very little to reconcile me with the idea of death, he placed into my hands a tome entitled 'Short Treatise On God, Man & His Wellbeing' by his Dutch philospher idol. He said, with a somewhat optimistic tone, that Spinoza was at least more graspable than that Kant chap whose 'Critique Of Pure Reason' I had once dabbled in (mostly, I say in my defense, out of pure morbid curiousity). I was merely glad to have something with which to hide behind, lest any of the scarier old military types attempted to get matey with me. I got through the first two chapters or so, and it wasn't too bad. The ideas about the Essence of God and the Substance of Man did tickle the noggin. That being said, I felt he could have done better than writing the bally stuff out as if it were the offspring of a mathematics lesson and the ramblings of a deranged mystic. Once he came to the bit about Wholes and their Causes I drifted right off.

'WOOSTER!'  
I spasmed awake, the back of my head smacking into an unfortunately placed terracotta pot. As the waking world returned about me, the sound of Tuppy and Angela arguing amongst the ficus plants registered in my ears, as well as the sight of Jeeves and Aunt Dahlia standing over me expectantly.  
'Mrs. Travers has something she would like to show you, sir.'

It was now early evening. I stared down at the book, open on a page detailing the finer points of Providence and Things, and admitted defeat.  
We followed her from the garden room, upstairs to the far end of the Court. She led us into a bedchamber on the third floor, spacious but disused. Apart from the primordial specimens of furniture about the room, there was an haphazard clump of items which, from the lack of dust, looked to have just been deposited there recently.  
'Much of Uncle Anthony's estate has already been settled, and apart from the silver he bequeathed to Tom, these are the objects he has left us. Some of them have already been claimed, but I would like each family member to take something in honour of his generosity.'  
I examined a collection of taxidermied pigeons sitting on the dresser, glass eyes leering creepily.  
'Who's taking these?' I asked.  
'With any luck, the bin man,' my aunt replied through her teeth.  
As I semi-consciously began poking around the mass of curios, I caught wind of her voice again:  
'Take your time. Have a good look around and let me know afterwards what junk you'd like to take off my hands.'  
Then, fainter, I heard her mutter:  
'Jeeves, I entrust you to not let him keep anything too revolting.' I had a feeling she was casting an eye on those pigeons again.  
'No, madam.'  
'Very good. Happy hunting.' And off she popped to herd her other guests.

This room had been deprived of all its light bulbs, the only source of brightness being a kerosene lantern that our hostess had placed on the mantelpiece of the small fireplace. In the waning light, surrounded by the personal effects of a dead man, I suddenly felt a bit Gothic.  
Jeeves was flipping through some musty, gilt edged books piled upon the bed.  
'Most surprising that a strategist and man of combat such as Sir Melchett should be enamoured of the works of the Brontë sisters...'  
His train of thought derailed when he beheld the vermillion smoking jacket that his jubilant young master had just disovered.  
'Oh, sir…'  
'Isn't it just _corking!_ Oh, could you picture me welcoming guests to the flat in this number, perhaps paired with a jaunty fez?'  
'I'm trying not to, sir.'  
'A bit big about the shoulders, but I'm sure you could bring it in a little, what?'  
'I regret to say, sir, that if you entrusted me to take to that object with a pair of scissors…'

Several arguments such as this followed the course of our little rummage around. The evening wore on, until the light outside was no more and it was night-time proper. A small voice in the back of my head (one possibly imbued with Jeeves' Dutch philosopher) that had been hollering about how dashed immoral it was to poke around a dead man's effects, grew steadily louder. I was just about to drag myself into a standing position and tell my man so (he was currently examining an old service revolver and looking unnervingly pleased with it), when a little glimmer of tarnished gold, made almost umber in the light of the lantern, caught my eye. Turning again, I could now see it winking out at me from under the bed.  
Dissenting against what better judgement I had, I reached a trusting hand inside the cobwebby cavern. Satisfied that no pointy beasties lurked within to make a supper out of my treasured mitt, it closed around what felt like a cold metal handle. With a great heave-ho, I dragged something heavy and bulky out into the weak lantern-light.  
Jeeves had crossed the room to assist me. The discovery was a big lacquered wooden chest, its smooth finish made chipped and weathered by the ravages of old Poppy Time. It, like the room's indigenous furnishings, was caked in a fine film of dust.  
Suddenly, the moralising, philosophising voice in my head took leave of the Wooster corpus and appeared before me in solid Jeevesian form.  
'I do not believe this is one of the articles eligible for acquisition, sir.'  
I grinned a canary-stalking grin at him.  
'Come now, Jeeves, I know you want to take a little peek as much as I. How can curiousity kill the cat if it's not out of the box?'  
His reprimand gave way to a brief moment of confusion, at which I took the liberty of lifting the lid from the casket. With a giddiness heretofore known to me only as a schoolboy in the pilfering of gingernuts, I took a peek inside.

Sitting upon the top of its contents, swathed in yellowed tissue paper, was an item of clothing. Carefully lifting it and crumpling away its wrappings, I recognised a pale, gossamer evening gown in fair shades of blue and violet. The unabashed femininity of its silky, flowery design was more than made up for by its considerable size.  
'By Jove, this must have been made for a girl who could crush Honoria Glossop with one fist…'  
'Sir…'  
Astonishment was written upon the face of my valet. Which made me take heed, for though astonishment may cross my own face every other week, it takes a phenom-thingummy of the miraculous, once in a blue moon variety to rattle Jeeves in such a way.  
Stacked neatly beneath the gown was a series of small canvases and bristol boards. Jeeves had picked the top one off the pile, and was drinking in its contents mutely. Wordlessly, he turned it around to show me the painting upon it.  
There, in vivid, saturated oils, sat a portrait of a young man in the swamp-green togs of a lieutenant of His Majesty's Armed Forces. And if it weren't for a few minor differences in bearing, hair colour and the overall shape of the chin, he could have been Bertram Wilberforce Wooster himself.  
As I gawked at this ghostly doppleganger, something caught Jeeves' eye on the back of the bewitching canvas, and he managed to find his voice again.  
'Th… there seems to be something written on the back in pencil.'  
He squinted in the dim light.  
'"Self-portrait: by Lieutenant The Honourable George Colthurst St. Barleigh MC, Christmas 1914."'  
I smiled the grand smile of the illuminated.  
'Cousin George!'  
  
ooOOoo  
  
'Who, sir?'  
'Aunt Dahlia was telling me about him earlier, my grandmama's kid brother's son. He was in the war with Uncle Anthony.'  
'By which you mean Sir Melchett, sir.'  
He took another look at the painted likeness. 'It is quite unsurprising to hear of your blood relation to this gentleman. Such a striking likeness.' I saw something that seemed distantly akin to lust shimmer across his noble features, and for an extremely surreal moment I felt jealous of my own dead look-alike of a second cousin.  
Brushing it off, I reached once again into the chest, wondering what surprises would unfold in the subject of old George's second painting. Bating my breath, I gazed upon a rather watery daub of the Seven Sisters. (No, not female septuplets, but those chalky white mountainous dealies by the sea in the South Downs.) Likewise there were some still lifes and sun-drenched figures in white trousers, as well as a rather off-putting scene of a brave young tommy standing over the body of a nun in a hellish blackened warscape— that one I replaced quite quickly.

Towards the bottom of the pile sat something a bit more promising. Two classically-styled male nudes entwined passionately, with a quiver of arrows and an errant strand of red silk billowing off the shoulder of the taller.  
'Jeeves,' I intoned with something of a purr, 'What do you make of this?' I handed him the canvas. Another emotion fluttered its way on and off his physiog, this time not as readable as before.  
'This is a reproduction of a famous painting by Jean Broc, sir. I have seen the original at Poitiers.'  
'Oh? And what is it?'  
'It is entitled "The Death of Hyacinthos".'  
After enquiring to Jeeves about the similarity of this name and the name of the hero-come-flower he had mentioned, he replied that they were indeed one and the same, proceeding to fill me in on the posish of this doomed figure. I sat at his feet, eager disciple that I am, as he told all.

Apollo, Greek God of all things warm and shiny, had fallen daffily in love with the young shaver. Being something of a clever clogs, versed in science, music and athletics, he taught his fresh-faced, eager beau everything that a paragon of the ancient world should know. (I suspect that Messr. Sunshine had some sort of deal going with his uncle Poseidon, and was supplied with a constant bounty of fish to feed his marvellous brain.) Anyway, two hearts entwined, Apollo teaching Hyacinth, all seemed to be well. But it turned out that Zephyrus, a rather mean-spirited cove with what you could call a messy family tree, wanted Hyacinth for himself. As he had dominion over the West wind, he decided to use his powers for a downright wicked end. One day the two lovebirds were out playing at discus. Apollo gave the thing a good chuck for Hyacinth to catch, and the cad Zephyrus blew the discus off-course, causing it to wallop poor Hyacinth right in his curly crown. As the youth lay dying, the God of the Dead came to claim him, but instead Apollo turned him into the very flower that Aunt Dahlia had placed on Uncle Anthony's grave.  
'Of all the bally, nerve, Jeeves!' I exclaimed when he had finished the story (having used a much prettier rhetoric than I). 'I hope that that Zephyrus weed… um… well, I hope he at least lost sleep over it.'  
'I'm certain he did, sir.'  
I picked up the canvas of the tragic pair again, this time comprehending what the painter was trying to get at. Damned shame. So much promise lost so young.  
Then, as I examined it further, I saw that Jeeves had been quite right in saying that this had not been the original masterpiece. Smeared across small sections of the paint was some kind of pale wash which made the colours run in places. It was as if a waterlogged brush had been flicked at the completed work, leaving a light pattern of little marks upon it.   
I wondered when my gentle coz had painted this one. Perhaps in the trenches, with inferior equipment? I flicked the thing over to check the date.  
'Jeeves!'  
'Sir?'  
'Are all canvases supposed to have note-books affixed to the back?'  
Said n. b., bound in leather and almost as aged and battle-worn as Aunt Agatha, had been affixed within the frame of the canvas' back with some sort of putty. With one gingerish motion, I managed to easily pull it free of its fixture. Opening up the first jaundiced, stain-blotched page:  
'"The Personal Memoirs of Anthony Cecil Hogmanay Melchett.'"  
My manservant and I shared a Look. With a definite captial L. If raiding a dead man's posessions was slightly less than righteous, then I definitely felt the great overtone of wrongness in the notion of invading a dead man's private thoughts. Especially ones that had been squirreled away so vigilantly. But since that crate had opened, Jeeves and I had begun to make a string of tantalising discoveries. Dare we relent just before approaching the Whatsit _de Résistance?_

Fading into earshot came the braying bellows of not only Aunt Dahlia, but of Angela and Tuppy as well. Their shoes clacked ominously closer to the door. Jeeves began smoothly and flawlessly replacing the paintings and the frock, seeing to it that the chest was then tucked neatly back under the bed.  
Thinking quickly, I stashed the journal beneath my jacket, and assumed the best un-canary-eating expression I could muster.  
When the ancestor asked me if I had found anything of Uncle Anthony's that I wanted, I told her I would sleep on it. We were ushered fussily off to bed, and a hint of a scowl marked Jeeves' countenance as he caught sight of the prize I had smuggled away.  
'Oh, come now, I know it's not exactly respectful, but neither is pinching an eighteenth-century cow creamer,' I tutted as he poured me into my heliotrope pyjamas.  
'I suppose that is an equitable rationalisation, sir,' he responded soupily.  
'Besides,' I beamed, riding this new wave of superiority, 'You never know what Uncle Anthony could have intended for this book. Perhaps he wanted, one day, to tell his story to the world. We may just have saved him from obscurity and given him the gift of immortality! We could do likewise for Cousin George if we ask for his paintings!'  
'As you wish, sir.'  
'Besides,' I chuckled, well pleased, 'Would you rather I keep this, or ask Aunt Dahlia for that vermillion smoking jacket?'  
I was met with silence this time. Perhaps my smarminess was doing more to cheese him off than my purloining of a private document.  
As I clambered into bed, I readied myself to do some late-night research into the mind of the man who had been farewelled that day by so many. Before tucking into his writings, I looked expectantly to Jeeves, who in a moment of overt sourness, denied me my usual good-night kiss before heading downstairs to his own lodgings. In fact, the icy 'good-night' uttered by my man had a wind chill of minus eight.  
I tchah'ed at the closing door, refusing to let it get to me.  
'You'll keep, Reggie,' I muttered, and then proceeded to tuck into the elegant copperplate-ish handwriting awaiting me on the antiquated pages.  
  
ooOOoo


	2. Chapter 2

10th July, 1913  
Brinkley Court, Worcestershire

This journal had been given me by my late father as a 20th birthday present, with the express intent of recording my experiences in the Armed Forces. As is often the case with such well-intentioned gifts, its pages have remained blank for twenty-four solid years. That being said, it would have to number among the world's most well-travelled books, having accompanied me to the Sudan as a nervous Captain of a nervous company, South Africa as an eager Lieutenant Colonel, and as a thoroughly bored and jaded Brigadier to the subcontinent. And through all this carnage and fire and slaughter and strife, it has remained silent. Whatever thoughts and feelings that have passed through my slowly wearying body have remained secret and temporal. Private sensations that glisten brightly for their own brief moments, then fade away, forgotten in the surrounding chaos. Pain. Bloodlust. Anger. Joy. Despair. My public face as a General, solider, bloodthirsty killer and doting older brother are what linger in the light of day. Anthony Melchett the man is an unspeakable secret that hovers between them all.

So perhaps it is only appropriate, in this time of peace, that I should finally start recording my private existence. Perhaps it is appropriate that today was the day which saw a surge of true excitement course through my nerves. Such an experience as I have not felt for a good twenty-four years.

Today it is my forty-fourth birthday. The Travers invited me over to celebrate, together with Dorothy. I was more than glad to get away from London. Earlier in the week I had been forced into a celebratory night of drinking with some of the boys under my command. Not for the first time, I reflected on how the bonds of brotherhood seem to become a total farce in peace-time. I suppose it has something to do with having to relate to one's fellow soldiers on an interpersonal level, rather than as comrades in arms, willing to die for King and Country. There is one scaly little Lieutenant, an Edmund Blackadder, whose distinct lack of graciousness I find particularly loathsome. He has picked the brains of his fellow soldiers, learning how to manipulate them and thus weasel his way into an easy, honourless military career that exploits the talents and work ethic of others. He feels he also has me under his thumb, because I have been wise enough to play the mad, bellowing old militant in his presence. Should the need arise to give him his come-uppance, he won't know what hit him.

This morning, my sister and I found ourselves on the steps of Brinkley Court. We were welcomed cordially by dearest Gertie and old Lawrence, who were excited to tell us about the fantastic spread that had been planned for the evening. I noticed Dorothy's manner was civil but still quite melancholy. I swallowed my guilt, reminding myself that young Tom would have made her a poor match. I would make it up to her by finding a suitable husband, one who complemented her thoughtful temperament. When we were informed that the Woosters would be joining us, Dahlia among the party, my guilt rose further. Dorothy would have to suffer through talk of the wedding plans. I gave my sister's little hand a reassuring squeeze, already planning on how to divert Dahlia's conversation away from her upcoming nuptials to the upcoming hunting season.

It was in this quite typical domestic tableau that my guard was down. My only real concern was for the feelings of my sister, and apart from that, I allowed myself to feel genuinely tired. We sat in large wicker chairs in the garden room, we took elevenses, we chatted in polite, tranquil voices. I felt my age and my lack of ardour. The tedium was almost blissful. Just before noon, we were joined by the Colthurst St. Barleighs, and it was then that my pitiable, weather-beaten being received a freakish bolt of the sublime.

I had read romances to Dorothy since she was a child. I think we both enjoyed the fanciful ideas of earth-shattering moments, when the embattled heroines became primal creatures attatched to their mates by forces more powerful and inexplicable than man-made convention. We had combed over 'The Mysteries of Udolpho' and 'Jane Eyre' together ritually. For me, love was more like the cozy, relaxed feeling of familiarity we cherished for those novels, not the contents within. In younger, less reflective days, there had been many shameful and thrilling rushes of baser passions, indulged in clandestine corners for terrifying and wondrous brief moments, but that had been something quite apart.

All of these conflicting experiences, in an insane and miraculous whirl, awakened and screamed noiselessly through me as George entered the garden room.  
George Colthurst St. Barleigh, only son of Rowland and Patricia Colthurst St. Barleigh. Old Etonian. Currently on holiday from his studies at Cambridge. And an unspoiled creation of God almighty that serves to complete some nameless yet aching incompleteness in this poisonous, dismal world.  
The last time I had seen him, he had been a clumsy, knobbly-kneed ten year old. I had barely regarded him as existing, only taking the time to tease the little blighter and torment his pet rabbits. (As I ponder my actions now, I wonder if killing a feeling, thinking human being in battle was a prelude to the cruelty of intentionally distressing a young child, or if it was not the other way around.) That shining freckled face, with its frame of confused blonde curls, had dimmed within my psyche like a half-remembered nursery rhyme.

His chin is weak, almost non-existent. The blonde curls have deepened to a light chestnut, yet remain just as thick and unmanageable as they were in his childhood. And he exudes a constant nervous energy. Unable to remain still, he fidgets, his long slender fingers toying absently with various parts of his clothing (a lapel, a cufflink, the seam of his trousers). His face is in a state of perpetual shift, one gleaming expression melting into another. His speech is of the same substance— he puncuates his sentences with skittish particles and idiomatic fragments. The gentle light baritone that springs from his small, prettily shaped mouth is, quite simply, sunshine. He of the mercurial spirit, of the alarming and childish blue eyes. He of the uneasy impasse between boyhood and masculine ripeness. My poor faculties of body and soul have been ambushed by a creature of impossible sweetness.

It is past midnight, and he currently lies in the guest bedroom directly beneath mine. The veins inside me thud with a thrill as anxious as it is delightful. I reside excitingly close and excruciatingly distant to him. Our one brief exchange during the afternoon was almost entirely composed of pleasantries and aforementioned skittish particles. I asked him how he liked Cambridge, he told me very much. He smiled shyly and I dithered into a burning silence. At the piano, Dorothy serenaded us with the gush and shimmer of Debussy's Deux Arabesques.   
Just before I had diffidently picked up this journal, I had trekked silently out into the hallway, descended the stairs and stared down into the darkness at the door to his chamber. All of three times. A deranged spirit that won't shut up keeps urging me to knock on that door, and I don't quite know what this exploit would accomplish. There is no reason to believe that he doesn't still hold me in his imagination as the imposing bully who tortured his childhood pets, a frightening old battle-hardened brute to be avoided at all costs. Oh, but if I could charm him!

I must be content with what proximity I have to him now. There should be no lamenting the fact that tomorrow, he shall return to Cambridgeshire, divesting his world of Anthony Melchett completely. There should be satisfaction in knowing I may catch glimpses of him at future social events, observing from afar as he cavorts with colleagues far more worthy than I. The only other consolation I have comes from wallowing in the splendid incantation that has been stringing through the front of my mind ever since I first beheld him:  
George. George. George.

ooOOoo

I shifted a bit in my position under the duvet, and a strand of moonlight from yonder window fell upon the last three words from Uncle Anthony's hand. They had been stretched out over the entire length of the page, the flowing handwriting becoming all the more lyrical and intricate. The three capital Gs were lovingly swirled, graphic arpeggios that reminded me very much of Debussy's tinkly Arabesques (many was the painful hour I had been burdened with bashing the damned things out by my music master).  
I peeped at the clock, which bared down on me with a threateningly late hour. Unfazed, I eagerly turned the page to the next entry.

ooOOoo

12th October, 1913  
Brinkley Court, Worcestershire

So, I find myself again hunched over the same dear notebook, perched upon the same antique bed, imprisoned in the same isolated guest room as before. Little Dahlia Wooster has today become Mrs. Dahlia Travers, and after her honeymoon in Scotland, shooting pheasants, ducks and moorhens, she will return here as the Lady of the House.  
God help me, his voice is seraphic. At the reception, he performed a swelling, dulcet setting of a Robert Louis Stevenson poem, accompanied masterfully by Dorothy. A few hours ago, darting between the last lingering wedding guests, I madly scurried into the Travers' library, determined to hunt down the original text. Transcribing it from the obliging anthology I located will be a happy excerise:

Let Beauty awake in the morn from beautiful dreams,  
Beauty awake from rest!  
Let Beauty awake  
For Beauty's sake  
In the hour when the birds awake in the brake  
And the stars are bright in the west!

Let Beauty awake in the eve from the slumber of day,  
Awake in the crimson eve!  
In the day's dusk end  
When the shades ascend,  
Let her wake to the kiss of a tender friend  
To render again and receive!

I cannot begin to express the rumblings of jealousy that rendered my sweet rapture tart. George and Dorothy, both young and beautiful, harmonised and merged their musical gifts to create a moment of pure joy. I sat there, passive, only able to marvel at it. Long have I envied my sister's musical talent, and today I would have readily slaughtered all the other listeners in the room just to have partaken.

I hope against hope that Dorothy, who has so gotten over Tom that she spent most of today smiling, has not fallen under the same thrall as I. Reason offers no basis for her not to be compatible with such a tender young man, and to prohibit their union would be an agony and a disgrace. The love of my baby sister and the concrete indifference of my treasured idol would do nothing to sway me. No noble notion of familial piety could override my futile greed for him.  
He will probably marry well. A cooler character than mine would scheme to affiance the two people whom I love most, so they would always remain close to me. But, curse my folly, it is something I simply cannot do. As much as I do not like it, nature intended me to be a ruthless ape of a man.

ooOOoo

3rd August, 1914  
London

Following their mobilisations against France and Russia, as well as their threats towards Belgium, we have officially declared war on Germany. Last night I farewelled Dorothy at our home in Worcestershire, once again facing the possibility of never seeing her again. I have instructed Mrs. Galsworthy, our housekeeper, to look after her as tenderly as if she were a daughter, and have informed her that we were up to chapter seven of 'Wuthering Heights'.  
For obvious reasons I cannot relate details of our plans and maneuvers within these pages, but we shall be heading to the continent soon. Flickers of fear are seen in the eyes of everyone I speak to. The original dispute between Austria-Hungary and Serbia so quickly engulfed their respective allies, that the final scale of this conflict is a shock that has not quite sunken in. It may be that the entire world will soon be set on fire. God have mercy on our souls.

ooOOoo

September 1914  
Franco-Belgian border

My regiments have staked out their territory, and it is already a sea of mud and refuse scarred with trenches. The commanding officers have been settled in a nearby château, from which we plan and ponder and argue, and sometimes inspect the dank and claustrophobic dens of our troops. I have been equipped with a valuable piece of office equipment in the form of Captain Kevin Darling. He's cowardly, unctuous and pedantic, in short a perfect administrative lackey. Blackadder has, through some form of double-dealing, also been promoted to Captain of his own company, and I am determined to keep one eye fixed closely on him. Our allies down South have already halted Fritz's would-be assault on Paris, losing whole regiments of their boys to do so. Likewise, British blood has cascaded upon the soil of Flanders through our own first offensive campaigns. Further death and glory awaits us. I anticipate the Field Marshal's next order with grim allegiance.  
There is now little time to wax poetic like this. But on nights when I cannot sleep, my mind wanders back to Brinkley Court, and to the blithe, coy youth with the voice like sunshine.

ooOOoo

2nd December, 1914

The administerial nightmare of processing Lord Kitchener's swarm of voulenteer recruits is slowly chugging along, as it has struggled to do since the war began. We are now seeing a great influx of young volunteers, callow faces impatient to butcher Huns and rescue French peasant girls.  
This morning, George stood to attention before me in the trenches, a freshly made Lieutenant.

He is under Blackadder's command, another underling added to his web. At least the benefit of having the butterfly in with the spider is that I can supervise the both of them at once. Should he try and craft my little chipmunk into a human shield or a whipping boy, I shall have the little sod courtmartialed.  
This afternoon, I surveyed the endless rows of mutilated, dying, shell-shocked and otherwise damaged figures lying on inadequate bedding in the hospital. My only response to the rows and rows of astounding human suffering was to vow to return George to his mother whole and unspoiled. I shall be listening to the tactical deliberations of the Field Marshal and my fellow Generals even more thoroughly than before.

ooOOoo

Christmas Eve night 1914

After reeling at the massacres at Ypres, Aisne and La Bassée, a wonderful, alien calm has settled upon the battlefields tonight. Earlier this evening, when down at the trenches, I caught the off-key crooning of 'O Tannenbaum' wafting across No Man's Land. The tommies have decorated their freezing, disease-ridden dugouts with make-shift decorations. Even now, the tiny pin-pricks of candle light in the murky, muddy darkness are still impressed upon my eyesight.

ooOOoo

15th March, 1915

The mad screaming of our most recent battle at Neuve Chapelle has finally receded. One and a half miles of ground was recaptured by the Allied forces. We do not yet have final numbers of our casualties, but is currently estimated to be at least three thousand dead. Having waded through the masses of injured tommies and disfigured corpses with my Brigadiers, it is clear that the number is set to rise sharply. It seems unlikely that the stench of blood and smoke will ever leave the fields of the Franco-Belgian countryside. It has even permeated the château. I have taken to the daily ordering of fragrant flowers for my bed-chamber— with enough blooms to mask the smell of death, it is not as much of a struggle to sleep.  
George is still sitting in his trench, untested. Oddly enough, I have Blackadder's cowardice to thank for this. He claims his platoons did not receive the orders, despite Darling's insistence that he had phoned the company well in advance. As such, no charges of desertion can be laid.

My hope of a clean and decisive victory has now fully evaporated. We never could have anticipated the level of destruction that has already been unleashed by this mechanical and ruthless form of warfare. As we hammer out the same methods and the same commands, sending mothers' trusting sons to their blood-spattered fate, the noblest thing I can hope to achieve is keeping the men's morale as bouyant as possible. The smug grin that I've tacked onto my maw for the tommies has made my facial muscles ache like the dickens.  
As of today, I have ordered chocolate rations to be tripled.

ooOOoo

26th October, 1915

The struggle to take the town of Loos was a disaster. Granted, we did capture the territory, for a matter of precious days, until our retreat. For all our fruitless endeavours, the Allied forces have lost at least thirty thousand men. The German machine guns consumed them on the marshy ground like wildfire burning up young saplings. Haig wants to send out another offensive, but the constant bombardment of rain and German shells will probably render such an endeavour utterly pointless.

Blackadder's platoons were amongst the offensive forces. I could not rest until I had found George. I scoured the dead, the injured and the survivors, and after three days of searching, finally looked directly into his face. I needed to be certain that the light of life and youthful bloom had not left his eyes. He was helping a Sergeant to dole out rations, and smiled when he saw me approaching. Though tired and covered in mud, I felt the vigour return to my heart to address my tattered, decimated division with some form of hopefulness.  
Later in the day we also recovered Blackadder himself, cowering in a French dugout and feining a broken leg.

ooOOoo

These terse, graphic entries detailing blood, sweat and munitions seemed to carry on for a good chunk of the journal. At the risk of seeming an utter cad who lacks respect for our fallen coutrymen, I confess I began to skim through all the nasty bits, trying to find something that was more marvellous than morbid. For all the mystery novels I'd read in my time, non-fictitious piles of corpses made my skin crawl.  
Flicking through the entries, something suddenly fell out of the tome into my lap: a yellowed old envelope. Ah-hah, now the plot would begin to pick up again. Opening it, I extracted a letter that looked to be very well handled, worn out through frequent re-reading. My heart leapt when I recognised the confident, robust hand of my favourite aunt.

ooOOoo

Brinkley Court  
Market Snodsbury  
—, Worcestershire  
England, United Kingdom

24th July, 1916

The Office of General Major Anthony Cecil Hogmanay Melchett  
c/o — Battalion, The — Regiment  
Château —   
Nord-Pas-de-Calais, France

Uncle Anthony, you old egg!  
So glad to hear you had a happy birthday this year. I figured a superior scotch was the only present you would truly appreciate. The good old British stiff upper lip sometimes needs a little wetting. Nevertheless, do keep your chin up. I'm sure you'll be home before too long, chasing foxes across the meadows and dales with the Quorn and the Pytchley, and 'Behhhh'ing to me over the country miles. The Prime Minister certainly seems confident that all this mess will be resolved before too long. He seems to have a touch of the daft muttonhead about him, but still I remain cautiously optimistic.

Uncle Rowland and Auntie Pat wanted me to tell you how thankful they are to you for keeping an eye on George. You know as well as I that the boy is a few cards short of a full deck, and even in peace-time I feel better when he is chaperoned by somebody with sense. His letters have been full of vigour and confidence, singing the praises of your brilliance as a commander. I remember the get-togethers at your family's estate, where he'd follow you about like a freckly puppy in his school blazer and knee-socks. No matter how terrible you were to him (or his rabbits), he'd just continue worshipping you as the quintessence of an officer and a gentleman. I think a very large part of his reason for joining the war effort was your own influence. He's been sending some of those marvellous paintings of his along to his parents, mostly of the English countryside that he's obviously missing. I was quite surprised that he's had the time for painting, what with all the gruelling drills, watches and Jerry-slaying you're all in the thick of.

So Speckled Jim is now a member of His Majesty's Armed Forces! All those years of being cooped up in your aviary, and now he's risking life and wing to send messages to the tommies! Your valour must have rubbed off on him— I could imagine most birds just making a break for the Caribbean if pressed into such service. Be sure to give him a chummy scratch on the head from me.

My Angela is continuing to thrive. She got into Tom's silver collection the other day, I don't know how the little bugger found the key to the display cabinets. She's becoming just as sharp as her old lady. Our poor nanny, a good woman by the name of Miss Swynford, has always a lot to cope with.  
Dorothy misses you daily. I felt for the poor lass, so I insisted she come and spend a few months with us instead of kicking about a brother-less household. I'm sure she's already elucidated you on some of the goings-on here at Brinkley Court in the great lengthy sagas she pens for you.  
Please do drop us a line soon. We all wait eagerly to hear of your latest daring exploits for King and Country.  
All my love,  
Mrs Dahlia Travers.

ooOOoo

It was almost two a. m., and I could feel my blood sugar drooping rapidly. Not wanting to fall asleep with visions of muddy cadavers dancing in my head, I took a page from Tuppy's previous adventures and snuck down into the pantry for a quick fix of one of Anatole's sugary creations. I padded silently back up to my room with a scrumptious plate of petits fours, scoffed them gleefully down and pressed on. I found an entry, some pages along, that looked to promise more than lamentations of failed battle plans.

ooOOoo

7th March, 1917

Blackadder, that bilious, pigeon-murdering cockroach, gave the order to send George out on a mission in No Man's Land. The moment I was informed of his choice of personnel, I went down to the trenches myself, smacked his evil skull against a splintered wooden wall and stuck the business end of my service revolver in his mouth, fully ready to send him to his demonic maker. The moment I hesistated in pulling the trigger saw George enter the dugout with one of the platoon's smellier privates. The mission had not yet commenced, and I was able to pass the fatal task onto a pair of clumsy corporals from another brigade, neither of whom will be missed.

What is unfolding in Russia is now no secret to either ourselves or the Hun. Bolsheviks have stirred sections of the Allied Forces into tumult. After all the hindrances we've suffered of late, seeing the Ruskies pull out of the Eastern Front is the last thing we need.   
As Haig tries to formulate a cunning plan to respond to the inevitable redoubling of the German forces here in Flanders, I have decided to arrange a concert recital for the troops whose bodies will soon be rotting in the same quagmires as their predecessors. If they must die tomorrow, I will see to it that they eat, drink and be merry today.

The show will consist of acts entirely peopled by the tommies. They will entertain their fellow troops at first, after which I shall have the show relocated home to the London Palladium, permanently out of harm's way. I am almost certain that George will leap at the opportunity to share his beautiful voice with the regiments, and thus my oath to return him to Mother Colthurst St. Barleigh, unscathed by the Hun, will be happily fulfilled. I am toying with the possibility of nudging Blackadder into the director's chair through some means, if only because I know he will inevitably make an attempt to join the production anyway. And nobody should have to hear the loathsome little creep sing. Furthermore, I've heard he cowers at the mention of my name since the revolver indicent, and as such he will be easier to manipulate than other troops with more spine.  
Nuts to Fritz and his howitzers, the show must go on.

ooOOoo

Another insert was wedged between the pages here, a small printed program on stiff card, complete with decorative edging and black-and-white illustrations. It was quite a spiffingly corkingly pretty little thing, and I suspected Cousin George's dab hand had something to do with its design. It ran something like this:

*

The — Regiment  
In association with the fabulous village theatre at —, Nord-Pas-de-Calais  
Present:

~**THE TOURING TOMMIES**~  
A spectacularly splendid concert party

DIRECTED BY CAPTAIN EDMUND BLACKADDER MC

Theatre De —  
3rd, 5th and 7th April 1917, 8pm

~**PROGRAMME**~

Official welcome and introductions by General Sir Anthony Cecil Hogmanay Melchett VC DSO KCB

ACT I

• "We're All Going Calling on the Kaiser" (Caddigan) – Colonel Williver Hendry, accompanying himself on the kazoo  
• A soliloquy from "King Richard III" (Shakespeare) – Private Larry Oliver  
• Seargeant Hildebrand Pratt and the dazzling feats of his trained troupe of earwigs  
• "Whoops, Mrs Miggins, You're Sitting On My Artichokes" (Curtis/Elton) – The boys of the 'Bristol Chums' battalion

20 MINUTE INTERVAL  
(Sandwiches and drinks will be served.)

ACT II

• "The Three Silly Twerps" – Corporal Archibald Smith, Corporal Eustace Johnson and ?  
• "Charlie Chaplin Comes to Flanders" – Private Sodoff Baldrick featuring Graeme the Slug  
• "Gorgeous Georgina" – Lieutenant George Colthurst St. Barleigh, accompanied upon the pianoforte by Seargent Robert Petheridge  
Who shall be performing:   
• "She Was Only The Ironmonger's Daughter But She Knew A Surprising Amount About Fish  
As Well" (Curtis/Elton)  
• "The Sun Whose Rays Are All Ablaze" (Gilbert/Sullivan)  
• "The Boy I Love Is Up In The Gallery" (Ware)

FINALE & CURTAIN CALL

In loving memory of Speckled Jim (1905-1917)  
Pigeon, Messenger, Lunch.

© E. Blackadder productions Inc. 1917. All rights reserved.

*

ooOOoo

4th April, 1917, the early hours of the morning

The boy I love is up in the gallery,  
The boy I love is looking now at me,  
There he is, can't you see, waving his handkerchief,  
As merry as a robin that sings on a tree.

It could just be the glut of port-wine in my system. It could just be a stupid coincidence on which I am founding a foolish hope. I cannot sleep tonight.  
The concert consisted of the sort of awkward, half-rehearsed muddling that dogs so many municipal town hall recitals. Little wonder that George's drag act commandered the stage for the better part of half an hour. Even caked in make-up and draped ridiculously in lace, the boy was nothing short of enchanting. His voice rang sweetly throughout the quaint auditorium, rousing the half-asleep audience into fervent applause by the close of the night. And as I sat there basking in his beatific smile, my heart lurching every time that his mascara-ringed, baby blue gaze glimmered my way, a design of pure hope and lunacy bloomed in the back of my mind.

My reputation as a half-sensible, blundering old walrus-face is well established amongst the trenches. Nothing preserves inner sanity during wartime better than a front of violent optimism. Given this apparent lack of sense, not only fastened upon my own mug, but the one that permeates the entire Western Front…  
Could it not be entirely plausible that mad old Melchett would be so taken in by a masquerade, that he would mistake a man for a woman? And court him? And take him to the upcoming regimental ball? And declare a blazing, stinging love that has been treasured for four solid years?

It would be walking the razor's edge. It would be a mad, selfish act, manipulating my poor cherished George terribly. The common sense that I prize says that he will only accept my advances out of fear, rather than reciprocation. There is no possible way he could ever return the wild adoration I feel for him. And, if my ruse is discovered, I have four years' worth of maudlin, impassioned memoirs that could, if found, facillitate a swift and dishonorable discharge to prison. Can I possibly risk my safety, and his safety, for the sake of a few stolen moments of romantic artifice?  
Perhaps I really have gone insane. I am in love with Gorgeous Georgina.


	3. Chapter 3

7th April, once again in the early hours of the morning  
  
The stars smoulder tonight, vivid baubles in the black abyss.  
There is a grand ballroom in a French château. The space is resplendent with Rococo ornaments and candlelight. Ballgowns waft across the tiles as polite conversations in English and _en Francais_ hum delicately above the orchestra. For a few precious hours, the horrors of shells and blood and disease melt away in an effervescent, surreal _printemps_. The slender, gloved fingers of a tall, sinuous sylph are clutched tenderly by the great mitts of an adoring, colossal troll in a ceremonial General's uniform. He cannot take his eyes off her. Her ladylike demureness and charm put the girls looking on to great shame. They waltz, and waltz, and waltz, losing touch with the tiles beneath, and with the partygoers around them. The only elements in existance are golden lights, champagne and two hearts pattering madly.

There were plenty of bemused looks. But once I had eavesdropped enough to be assured that it was barminess and not perversion that they attributed to me, I dismissed them for the evening, choosing instead to bathe in the lustre of my dancing partner. I was honoured to banter and joke with him. More of his warm and gentle temperament was revealed to me tonight than I would ever be privelege to with the usual social and regimental barriers up. He truly has an eccentric sense of humour, and moment by moment I found myself falling deeper and deeper in love with him. He marvelled at the chateau's grand oil paintings, which I had scarely ever taken heed of, lyrically musing over the history and technique of each one. He is not quite as daft as his peers insist. The lilac muslin adorning the curve of his firm, smooth shoulders taunted a snarling hunger in the pit of my stomach.

We discussed the U.S. A.'s declaration of war, the main event of the preceding day. He raptured over the exploits of both Charlie Chaplin of Sennet Studios and Lord Flashheart of the R. A. F., and I couldn't help but chuckle. Finding a quiet corner on one of the balconies, swimming in hoary starlight, I felt brave enough to impart to him some of the loneliness that has shadowed me for so much of my life. An expression of true sympathy rendered the delicate contours of his face even more exquisite. His hand pressed upon my forearm.  
One instance during the night saw me place a macaron between his awaiting lips. The last remaining filament of my cynicism was burnt up, because I could not deny that he had, intentionally, flirted with me.

At some point, close to midnight, we strolled arm in arm through the gardens. The shrubs of the once proud estate have grown wild and unpruned, but Spring is still insistently sending forth her blossoms. Disordered bursts of jasmine and peony clouds dot the rambling pathways.

At this current moment, I am still far away from sleep, and I believe I will be so for a good while hence. So, it shall be some time before I can really test the authenticity of the following, and ensure that it was not all some delusion that visited me, some phantasm that paraded as truth in the witching hours. From that particular moment up until now, I cannot help but doubt everything I percieve, for it has been one of those singular, astonishing, supernatural events which seem to be allowed into our lifetimes once and once only.  
I tremble to recount this.

We stopped before the lily pond, the restful sound of frogs and crickets a welcome change from the boom and rattle of artillery fire. In a deliberate attempt to put him at ease, to ensure my behaviour in this dreamy setting would remain chaste, I started to blither on about the Picturesque. Dredging up all the names I had been saddled with way back at Cambridge, I touched on Turner, Cowper, Gilpin… any and all an open life preserver thrown out for the sake of preserving his honour.  
He half-listened to my inane poetic chatter. The dappled moonlight upon the viscous, murky pond held his attention far greater than I. When I noticed this I cast my eyes down, trailing off into mumbles. I thought perhaps I should allow him to finally escape back to the relative safety of trenches.  
He then spoke, his voice as soft and wavering as the glistening water.  
'Sir… Anthony… I do think I have fallen quite in love with you.'  
I was only brought out of an appalling stupor by the sight of tears falling from his eyes. Somewhere the clock struck twelve, and slowly, he reached up to brush his lips against mine. Ambrosia. Pure Ambrosia.  
It was a maliciously brief ecstasy. He drew away. Cold, wet blotches of his mute tears hung on my cheeks. With an unwavering nobility, a lamb solemnly awaiting its slaughter, he removed the elaborately styled hairpiece that had crowned his hallowed head. My Cinderella stripped himself of his guise, and a few confused chestnut curls tumbled down upon his furrowed brow.  
It took an age for me to recollect myself. Uttering his name, my fingers gently clutched his small chin, and his blue eyes finally fixed themselves upon me again, fearfully.  
I engulfed him in kisses, blood pounding in my ears. As his trepidation dissolved, his precious and nervous hands fooled with my hair and my shoulders, my collar and my cheekbones.  
Eventually finding an anchor in the form of a garden bench, I told him everything. Miserably, I anticipated him rising and retreating in disgust upon hearing of my deranged greediness. Instead he remained seated, almost undoing me by lovingly encasing my hands in his. 

The only point of contention was my desire to see him return home without having been party to the further terrors and carnage laid out in our futures. He emphatically declared his desire to stay by my side and see off the Hun once and for all. Even though a large part of me screamed out against this, I couldn't help but obey him. I promised to prevent the concert party from whisking him away to London. Heaven condemn me.

I have instructed him to re-don Georgina's wig, and inform Blackadder that his ruse was an unbroken success. He is to say that I proposed marriage to Georgina. I await one of two possible outcomes. Either Blackadder will panic that the travesty has reached such a hazardous level, and he will fabricate some story about the leading lady's unsuitability. Thus Georgina will have to be pulled from the show, and the tour. Otherwise I forsee a much less likely outcome: Georgina and I will actually marry. Lord knows how long we might be able to carry along such a charade. At some point, the both of us would most likely meet with a grisly traitor's fate at the hands of an outraged King and Country. But we would, for some radiant months at least, be able to make love with unchecked exuberance.

Even after all this deliberating, it was hours before we were able to cleave ourselves from each other. Even now, the divine ghost of his lips prickles over my awed skin. He is _printemps_ itself.  
  
ooOOoo  
  
25th April  
Paris  
  
There are moments when I have to be reminded there is actually a war going on. That the massacres and decay and endless shades of brown can be cleansed away by witnessing the blooming of chestnut trees seems proof enough to me of a higher power at work.  
And, oh, you fantastic shining Lord God, you are a true master craftsman. Everything pertaining to him is so very, very, extremely beautiful. The only discomfort I know now is upon the few occasions when I have to remove hands, lips and eyes from him. And even then, my prospect is consoled by the glories of Montmartre, the Champs-Élysées and the Palais Garnier. Why oh why did I nominate to put my life in the service of Ares, when Aphrodite's temple was waiting to be worshipped at?

I barely think of the day two weeks hence when our leave will be up, sending us back to the malodorous swamp that is Flanders. All that whirls before me is the superb paradise of Now.  
And Now, he reclines upon our fainting couch, fingering the petals of a potted hyacinth and fixing me with a luscious and kittenish gaze—  
  
ooOOoo  
  
Here the communique ceased briefly, the final word being yanked off the far edge of the page. My pulse had quickened a little at the suggestions of the luxuriant phrases. It bally well galloped into the lead upon realising what Anthony and George were probably doing as the ink dried on the paper. I tried hard not to think about Jeeves.  
Upon the next page was a different hand, a little more loopy and a little less compact. I decided that George was a right little sneak.  
  
ooOOoo  
  
25th April, during an afternoon of well jolly goings-on  
Anthony Melchett's strong manly arms  
The consummatory bed  
A state of utter bliss  
The love nest  
Avenue Montaigne, Champs-Élysées  
Gay Paree  
  
Oh Anthony, you big sop. You're going to inflate my head to the size of a bloody hot-air balloon with all this ego-stroking (and so much other stroking besides). And now, officially ascertaning that I am, and I quote, 'he of the mercurial spirit' and your 'treasured idol' for whom you nurse a 'blazing, stinging love that has been treasured for four solid years', I feel a grim new sense of responsibility coming on. At the age of twenty-three I may finally assume adulthood properly, and you'll probably stop loving me because of it. Can I have a Victoria Cross for my troubles?

In the 'superb paradise of Now', George is feeling happy, quite mutinous and also a little hungry. He is commanding Anthony to resume making mad, steamy love to him, and then to take him out for lobster, champagne and macarons.  
  
ooOOoo  
  
What followed was a few errant doodles sketched out by the same mischevious supplanter. The remainder of the current page was given over to love hearts, finicky filigrees, and a curious cartoon of the romantic leads of 'Jane Eyre'. The grumpy, black-clad Mister Rochester bounded after the retiring little governess, who obviously felt chagrin at the cheesy, toothy smirk on her master's face, not to mention the particularly oversized love hearts that stood for his eyes. The speech bubble emanating from his mouth read 'My mercurial spirit! My treasured idol! I love you stingingly!'  
Also, at the very bottom of the sheet, in playfully elaborate script:

'George Colthurst St. Barleigh loves Anthony Cecil Hogmanay Melchett  
Now and Forever.'

Gracing the expanse of the following double page was a cluster of ink studies, in various aspects, of a stalwart moustachioed gentleman. It took my overtired brain a few seconds to realise that these must be George's fond illustrations of his lover. Under a high, fine forehead was set a pair of darkly twinkling eyes. Peering out from behind the mammoth of a soup strainer was a charmingly crooked smile. I was certain that his mirthfully tousled, schoolboyish hair, flopping carelessly across his brow, must have usually been kept impeccable. The shoulders were broad, the large nose was crooked and the ears were strangely sweet and delicate. I don't know whether it was my stirred up sentiments or some obscure common ancestor, but I could have sworn there was a slight touch of the Jeeves about him.

Drinking in my fill, I then read on.  
  
ooOOoo  
  
2nd May  
  
I took my chipmunk to the Musée du Louvre. It did us well to arrive at the gallery in the morning, for I was sure that it would be a very long visit. Watched over by the legions of marble Venuses crowding the halls, he throughly pored over every painting that took his fancy, and I imagined the workings of his mind as it soaked in the various implementations of light and shade, colour, form and composition. Whatever deficiencies he might have in logic and deduction are more than compensated for by the gifts of his wonderful artistic sensibilities. He was particularly taken with Raphael's series of militant saints, the haloed Michaels and Georges slaying the beasts of Hell. I bought him a simply obscene amount of postcards and art books in the gift shop, featuring reproductions which he can study to his heart's content.

The trees of Paris are blooming into even greater splendour as the days continue to warm. One short week remains until we must return to the nightmare of shrapnel, mud, rats and festering skeletons. I have had word from Captain Darling that the offensive near Arras has been one long and desperate struggle. Our boys managed to grab a tenuous hold of a village towards Vis-en-Artois, but the loss of life in its capture was so great that they have been able to continue no further. This afternoon, on the way home from the gallery, George and I were the unfortunate witnesses to a mother of three being informed that all her sons now lie dead in the sludge of the countryside. I am disgusted, because my pity for the poor woman was so limited.

Tonight we will see Gluck's 'Orphée et Eurydice' at the Opera. It is the incarnation of the tale in which Eros takes heed of Orpheus' mourning, and rectifies the mistake he made in the Underworld, restoring his beloved Eurydice to life. A happy end for all and sundry, rendering the horrors of the river Styx and the pit of Tartarus worthwile. If only we should all be so lucky.  
  
ooOOoo  
  
Yet another insert, tucked fastidiously between the pages, fell out. It was a smallish oblong of card. George had created, in what looked like crayon, a miniature of a fellow with a great honking pair of wings on his back, who I can only assume was an angel. Dressed in some form of Classicalish-Biblicalish armour, and splashed with bold hues of blue and gold (albeit a touch faded with age), he held a huge spear in his grasp with which he was about to skewer some unholy monster from the abyss. It was all quite heroic, conjuring in me thoughts of Douglas Fairbanks and H. B. Warner.  
On the other side of the card was written the following:  
  
Anthony, my darling,  
Please do not despair! I cannot bear to think of you pacing the floor of that draughty old mansion, expecting at any moment the next Bosch offensive to blast us all to smithereens. You'll see, the brave lads of the Allied Forces will soon bear down on Berlin and smite the hideous Hun for good. We'll be welcomed home as bally icons— they'll probably name a day in our honour, and every year children will dance in the streets and gobble down commemorative biscuits. All this gunfire and butchering can't possibly last much longer. All the boys who lie wounded in the hospital wards will recover, and the dirt and stench and barbed wire surrounding us all shall be replaced with grass and flowers and leafy pastures. As Father has always said, nothing lasts forever, and all of this will soon be but a memory.

And speaking of Father, he sent me a new box of pastels, with which I made this Raphael copy for you from one of the lovely books you bought for me. I have likewise been drawing pictures for the boys: I drew a satyr for Private Baldrick, and Captain Blackadder requested that I reproduce the contents of a rather rude postcard featuring Japanese geisha girls doing peculiar things with ususpecting vegetables. I've been dabbling in canvas reproductions too, when I am able to find a moment to myself between our drills, patrols and the daily air-raids by Fritz.  
If it all gets too much for you, then think of the glorious weeks that we spent in Paris on leave. I know that's where my mind wanders after lights out. Next time, we'll go there in Summertime, for your birthday.  
I love you desperately.  
G.  
  
ooOOoo  
  
16th May  
  
This damned rain won't stop!  
Haig has ordered me to polish the finer plans of our next move. Naturally I cannot relate the particulars, but with the backing of the Field Marshal and the relative intelligence of Lloyd George's cabinet behind me, I am daring to allow a pinprick of hope to strain into being. We find ourselves with a position that, while far from ideal, may lead to a crucial victory that could mean the beginning of the end to this hell. If I survive this war, I have vowed to retire from service. I am too old and too jaded to put up with any more physical and mental toil that seems to only result in bloodshed. More tommies will have to die, but my heart is so shrivelled up that I no longer care— it is an effort to even acknowledge them as the sons of worried mothers anymore. All I care about, apart from myself and George, waits back home in Worcestershire.

The poor lambkin is in hospital, sustaining minor injuries from a Jerry bomb strike. I saw to it to settle him in one of the small and cozy wards free of the mutilated and the insane, and ordered one of the fluffier, maternally-minded nurses to see that his every whim is catered for. I feel no shame in my active favouritism.  
I now must shut out the sound of the distant shells long enough to will my brain out of lassitude. I shall close all the doors and windows to my office. To stimulate the old nerve centre, I'll get Darling to bring in some fresh bouquets of hyacinths and peonies, as well as a ginormous pot of coffee.  
  
ooOOoo  
  
20th June  
  
Through sheer might of firepower alone, we have captured the ridge near Messines. Our mines tore enormous chunks out of the countryside. Telegrams have claimed the explosions were heard in Paris and London.  
The Australian infantry in particular showed great spunk. Jerry surrendered in droves. We lost about one solider in ten, but for the first time during this hopeless joke of a war I feel as if the deaths have not been in vain. We now have a proper Belgian stronghold beyond Ypres, and though I dare not hope too high, if God deigns to be on our side we may be able to ensure the German surrender by the close of the year. Oh please, please, let this blasted war be finally reaching its concluding chapter.

George has just been released from hospital, and I have ordered him to board at the château with me for a few days to convalesce. Much convalescence was had the previous evening. At one point as I drifted between wakefulness and dozing, silently worshipping the sweet rise and fall of his young chest, I cast my thoughts to future days of peace-time. What will become of our little understanding? He swears he will never marry, but I cannot trust his father to allow that. Perhaps the once unthinkable prospect of betrothing him to Dorothy would be our way out. In such a queer set-up, at least I can be assured of remaining the man of the house. My poor sister passed her thirtieth birthday this year. Would that it were I could craft her an ideal husband out of filament and mud.

More strategising needs to be done before the next manouever. I am an increasingly busy man, mentally if not physically, and with some unstable hope of absolution in sight, I do not feel quite so terribly, terribly old.  
  
ooOOoo  
  
30th July  
  
My birthday present hangs demurely amongst the busy French panelling on the walls of my bed-chamber: two canvases from George. One is a reproduction of a French Neo-classical Hyacinth. The other, quite clearly its superior, is a delightful self-portrait, painted during Christmastime 1914 between friendly soccer matches and carolling with Jerry.  
The big push is scheduled for dawn tomorrow. The preparations and training for our manouevers did not go exactly to plan because of the rain, but I am hoping that our strategy is watertight enough to see the boys through. I shall be overseeing procedures and convening directly with all my Brigadiers and Colonels.  
Blackadder, predictably, tried to feign insanity to be shipped off home. I was quite tempted to call his bluff, just so I could have the satisfaction of seeing him locked up in a cell where he belongs, but his platoon has a part to play in our battle plans that cannot be denied.

Namely, the part of the yolk inside the shell. Homocidal maniac that I am, I have arranged for large flanks of men to cover Blackadder's troops throughout the whole operation as a consistent human shield. Haig did not seem to question my reasoning, or ask me why I was not pushing their particular company out into the heart of the German defences. Once again, I count on Blackadder's cowardice to follow these strange orders and prevent George from gallavanting out into the very front line. My little chipmunk's enthusiasm to run Fritz through can only be dampened by official orders, which he follows with unblemished obedience and honour.

It is close to midnight. It feels like I have smoked a thousand cigarettes today, wavering between exhiliration of possible, descisive victory, and preparing to wade through the greatest ocean of death than we have seen yet. In a few hours, Driver Parkhurst will arrive, ready to escort the last officers remaining here down to the trenches.  
Even within the relative safety of H. Q., there is still a possibility I may be blown to bits. Death has sat so near us all that I barely flinch at this prospect. If this stinking world of aggression and division has any mercy, we may just take the village of Passchendale tomorrow. We shall see what we shall see.  
  
ooOOoo  
  
Passchendale. That name rang dully in the back of my mind, being somehow familiar. Uncle A.'s hand seemed to cease here, the next few pages being completely blank. Taken by a sudden and rare urge for research, I slithered my feet into my slippers and snuck downstairs again.  
The first weedy, hesitant suggestions of approaching daylight were starting to slither through the windows. As I creaked my way into the library, I squinted for the mantelpiece clock.

Oh, my sainted aunt! Quarter to six! Jeeves (and as a matter of fact, the rest of the staff) was probably bathed and dressed and halfway through breakfast by this time, although while padding about the halls like an edgy tomcat I couldn't say I heard much.  
I knew there was a big unwieldily book about the G. W. somewhere on the shelves. I had seen Uncle Tom perusing it with some of the wrinkled funeral-goers during the evening. For the very first time, I wondered if _he_ had seen service in those godforsaken trenches. Uncle Tom the young tommy was a notion that had never before crossed my mind.  
After some sniffing about I found my quarry, big and khaki and heavy. Trying my best to be quiet, I heaved the thing over to the window-seat to make use of the grey, bashful morning light struggling away outside.

The contents seemed to go on forever. The rambling, overly-footnoted chapters were dedicated to everything from the causes of small indecisive battles, to Lord Kitchener's favourite potpourri mix. Eventually my eyes fell upon it: 'The Battle of Passchendale: 31 July - 6 November 1917'.  
The subheading beneath rattled off vital statistics. Tactical Allied victory. Operational Allied failure. Strategically inconclusive. Casualties and Losses: Disputed numbers, estimated between 500,000 and 800,000, all forces inclusive.  
Beyond that, my eyes just swam on the page, tired from their nocturnal efforts and straining in the gloaming.

It was with a kind of robotic manner that I popped the housebrick of a book away on its shelf and headed back upstairs. How could Uncle Anthony have died in that skirmish? He died little over a week ago. And yet, the atrociousness of the numbers of casualties needled away at my sleep-deprived bean. At least half a million dead. How could anyone get out of that sort of disaster unscathed?  
I flopped back down in bed, picking up the journal again. Too tired to think, too agitated to sleep, I just flipped the pages to and fro, operating on auto pilot.  
It took me a minute or so to notice another entry on the very last page, the ink here darker, the handwriting less spirited.  
  
ooOOoo  
  
Cold in the earth — and the deep snow piled above thee,  
Far, far removed, cold in the dreary grave!  
Have I forgot, my only Love, to love thee,  
Severed at last by Time's all-severing wave?  
  
Now, when alone, do my thoughts no longer hover  
Over the mountains, on that northern shore,  
Resting their wings where heath and fern leaves cover  
Thy noble heart forever, ever more?  
  
Cold in the earth — and fifteen wild Decembers,  
From those brown hills, have melted into spring;  
Faithful, indeed, is the spirit that remembers  
After such years of change and suffering!  
  
Sweet Love of youth, forgive, if I forget thee,  
While the world's tide is bearing me along;  
Sterner desires and darker hopes beset me,  
Hopes which obscure, but cannot do thee wrong!  
  
No later light has lightened up my heaven,  
No second morn has ever shone for me;  
All my life's bliss from thy dear life was given,  
All my life's bliss is in the grave with thee.  
  
But, when the days of golden dreams had perished,  
And even Despair was powerless to destroy,  
Then did I learn how existence could be cherished,  
Strengthened, and fed without the aid of joy.  
  
Then did I check the tears of useless passion —  
Weaned my young soul from yearning after thine;  
Sternly denied its burning wish to hasten  
Down to that tomb already more than mine.  
  
And, even yet, I dare not let it languish,  
Dare not indulge in memory's rapturous pain;  
Once drinking deep of that divinest anguish,  
How could I seek the empty world again?  
  
'Remembrance' by Emily Brontë  
  
Transcribed by Anthony Cecil Hogmanay Melchett, 31st July, 1932  
  
ooOOoo  
  
A dried, pressed hyacinth fell out from the book, into my lap.  
'Sir?'  
Jeeves had shimmered into my room with the first true reams of morning sunlight. He of the fish-engorged brain must have spied me trying to stumble about quietly downstairs earlier.  
When he caught sight of the hot tears that had shamelessly spilled from the ocular region, he swooped over to the bed, all frostiness from the previous n. forgotten.  
'Sir, what is it?'  
I was too far gone to arrange a sound in my throat any more coherent than a childish sob. I was pulled into the soothing mantle of his embrace, and felt a large, elegant hand drift through the frightful rat's nest that was my hair.  
'Oh, my poor Bertram.'

I felt his lips on my forehead and began to breathe a bit easier. As he cosseted the shuddering, whining Wooster corpus, I noticed him examining the jumbled pile of knick-knacks that had tumbled out of the diary over the course of the night. The letter from Aunt Dahlia, the concert-party programme, the pastel drawing/love letter from George, the flattened hyacinth. The decrepit old volume itself lay open at the heart-mashingly mournful poem. Even this early in the morning, his tremendous deductive powers took about a fiftieth of a second to screw all the fixtures into place.  
'I apologise for my coolness last night, sir. It seems Sir Melchett's memoirs are a far more meaningful inheritance than I had first supposed.'  
'Reggie…' I snivelled.  
Taking my chin in the same large, elegant hand, he directed my sore eyes to meet his own clear, dark cobalt orbs. I leant slightly into the fingers that swept across my shamefully wet cheek. Something similar to a smile, wide and warm by Jeevesian standards, bloomed across his lips.  
'If only the gentleman could have met you. Would that he saw your cousin's continued survival within you.'  
My voice had become an horrid, blubbery croak.  
'It… it's just so dashed _unfair_.'  
He resumed stroking my hair. 'Much commentary has been sparked on the needless loss of life during the Great War. The late Lieutenant Wilfred Owen's poetic works have provided quite a matter-of-fact view of the unfortunate circumstances: "What passing bells for these who die as cattle?"'  
I squashed one side of my face into his firm black vest, soaking in his deep, soft eloquence.  
'But, as I am sure you have come to understand, there are much worse sufferings in war than dying in combat.'  
Suddenly his grip upon me tightened a little. I felt a pang of something close to emotion behind it.

'Reggie?'  
'Yes, my glistening Cyparissus?'  
'Did you see service in the Great War?'  
A short, stiff silence soon gave way to his canny, collected response. 'I survived the war mostly intact. What difficulties I did face allowed me to appreciate the life to which I thence returned.'  
My heart almost imploded. 'Oh, I say…'  
'Please do not be upset on my account, Bertram. It is now all in the past.'  
We continued holding each other as the increasingly balmy sunshine glooped into the room. He kissed the tip of my ear.  
'Reggie?'  
'My own?'  
'Do… do you still have the uniform?'  
It was a bonafide smile that now cracked his veneer. I don't know whether he knows that I was serious or not. (Oh, could you not just _imagine_ him in that smart, be-medalled getup? Be still, my wanton appetite.)

The little patter of kisses soon became a full-blown smooch whirlwind. Just as I was about to let all my anxiety gust away, I felt someone's eyes on me.  
Aunt Dahlia, raising an eyebrow at me, from the open doorway.  
Jeeves instantly released me and soared to his feet, his deferential gaze cast earthwards.  
She harrumphed.  
'Oh honestly, Jeeves. Bertie can be pardoned for carelessness, but I thought at least you'd have enough sense to lock the bally door.'  
'I am sorry, Madam.'  
'Quite alright. In future, just be your usual mindful self. There's a chap.'  
'Yes, Madam.'  
It was a corkingly beautiful world.  
  
ooOOoo  
  
'By Jingo! It's quite a bit bigger than I thought it was. And the colours!'  
'Yes, sir. Many is the art aficionado, both academic and layman, who has vouched for the superior experience of absorbing the aura of an original work, as opposed to its duplicates.'  
'It runs rings around the splatters of poor old Corky, what?'  
'Though I am sure your friend Mr. Corcoran would not appreciate the comparison, sir, I would have to say that I quite agree.'

It had been almost three hours between Paris and Poitiers, as the Aston Martin flies. The journey had been well worth it, however, for not only did we enjoy an afternoon of driving through Gallic countryside of positively Cezanne-ish spiffiness, but we'd made the pilgrimage to see the work of art which cousin George had replicated. After paying our respects, we meandered through the cobbled streets of the pleasing provincial town, chomping on some fantastically buttery _crossiants._ As it turns out, 'The Death of Hyacinthos' had been a longtime favourite of Jeeves', in the same way I felt an affection for the best of Buddy DeSylva's ragtime ditties.

'When it was exhibited in the Paris salon shortly after its unveiling, it was looked upon most favourably as an allegory of the cyclical temperament of nature.'  
'Really? I had gotten the impression that all those sex-and-death sort of artworks tended to go through a hazing of boos, reprimands and fainting ladies.'  
'That is not always the case, sir, especially if the artist renders the theme of his or her work in such a delicate and restrained manner as Monsieur Broc. Ultimatley, the painting depicts creation eternally usurping destruction, because Hyacinthos' blood turns to flowers upon hitting the earth. No matter the trials and torments of mortal desire, that which is ripped apart will always reform, in some capacity or another.  
'"Wild Decembers, in those brown hills, have melted into Spring,'" I paraphrased.  
'Precisely, sir.'

The following morning we hightailed it back to Gay _Paris_. My man and I celebrated April in said metrop. by not only viewing chestnuts in blossom, but by making sweet _amour_ ritually and with grand intent, worshipping at the very temple of Aphrodite herself.  
  
FIN.


End file.
